


The Last Act of Determination

by mr_mercutio



Series: Last Act Universe [3]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-10-27
Updated: 2012-10-27
Packaged: 2017-11-17 03:08:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,776
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/546987
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mr_mercutio/pseuds/mr_mercutio
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Minerva waits out the end of the world at the place that she has sacrificed her entire life for: Hogwarts.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Last Act of Determination

The lake is incredibly calm, calmer than Minerva can remember ever seeing it. Its surface is like a mirror, showing only the peculiar sky above it and obscuring anything that might still lie below. Not that she would need to see into the lake to know that most everything that ever lived within it is gone now. The Merpeople had left long before any of the others, having abandoned the place when the Death Eaters took control. There once were ancient magics in the lake, passages that connected it to other bodies of water across the world, and it had not been a great difficulty for them to vanish. Then the Incident had happened, and all the other creatures that had made the lake their home had begun to disappear. The Squid had held on the longest, but it too had finally given up on them, just like the rest of the world. 

Minerva reaches a hand over the side of her boat to trail it in the water, just to see the ripples swim across the surface. The water is the exact same temperature as the air, and she could not see it dripping off her fingers, she isn't sure she would be able to tell it was there. It had seemed like such a nice idea when she'd settled on it, to wait out the end of the world on the water. She'd always loved boating, but never had the time to indulge herself. Now it was all hers: a nice little picnic basket, the gentle sway of the water, and the view of the school that she had given up her life for. 

"You're a fool, McGonagall," she mutters, and then she takes up the oars and begins to propel herself to another spot on the lake. It is a comfort to hear the splashes she makes as the boat meanders across the water. There are no more landmarks that seem to matter anymore, so Minerva just rows until her arms tire, and then she sets the oars aside. "There's no real reason to keep moving around like a twit," she berates herself, pulling the basket from beneath her seat and opening it. She takes out a bottle of Firewhiskey and takes a swig from it before settling back against a cushion at the prow of the boat. There aren't even clouds to watch drift across the sky anymore, but it is easier to stare at the strange colours of the sky than to look at the rubble that used to be Hogwarts.

"Two more hours!" Minerva hears a voice rise up from the village. "Only two more hours!" Rosmerta started calling out the time at the stroke of midnight last night, and it is the only way that Minerva has been keeping track of the time. She raises the bottle of Firewhiskey up in salute to the pale ghost of the sun and then takes another swig before closing her eyes and just drifting. 

After a time she pulls the basket over to her and takes out the last treat she's been saving: a single apple, a little wrinkled and dry but still a beautiful and inviting red. The colour of it stands out against the washed world around the lake, and she smiles at it. If anyone had ever asked her before what she would want her last meal to be, an apple would never have come to mind, but now it is all she wants. She's been intending on waiting for the last few minutes to eat it, so that she will still taste it on her tongue as everything falls apart, but now it doesn't feel as though waiting any longer will make a difference.

She is about to bite into it when she hears shouting, coming not from the village but from the castle behind her. Her heart skips a beat and she sits up abruptly, shielding her eyes to look towards the shore. Sure enough there is a figure rushing down from the gates, waving an arm and calling out to her. She tosses the apple back into the basket and grabs the oars, cutting deeply into the water and speeding to the shore. It must be Filius, come to try one last time to convince her to leave this place with him. As she approaches him she decides that she will say yes, that she'll put aside her pride and admit that she never really wanted to be alone, but that she just wasn't willing to give up the castle, give up the world that she fought so hard for. It had seemed so important at the time Filius was leaving, to not say that yes, the world had beaten her. The castle was the heart of her nigh eternal struggle, and to just walk away from it had seemed anathema to her then. Now, though, so close to the end, it is just a pile of rock, and the anticipation of a friendly face is far more precious.

Something inside Minerva twists a little when she pulls close enough to see that the man waiting for her is far too tall to be Filius. She thinks for a moment that perhaps it is Potter, finally come down from his perch atop Dumbledore's tomb, but no, he wouldn't do that. Potter is just as wrapped up in the past as she, perhaps even more so, and this close to the end he wouldn't budge from his vigil for anyone less than – 

"Mr. Malfoy," she says, finally realizing who it is that is awaiting her. She hasn't seen Draco Malfoy since the night of the Battle, and hasn't expected to. He looks as wan now as he did then, his hair long and ratty, his face drawn but his eyes shining with a determination that she envies a little. "Whatever are you doing here?"

He gapes at her like a landed fish and blurts out, "What are you doing in a _boat_?"

It is no different than it ever was, Minerva thinks. Everyone still acts exactly as they did before the Incident, still as oblivious as ever. Even she has held on to what used to be until now, when it is too late to do anything about it, and she smiles bitterly at the realization. "I suppose all students imagine their teachers do nothing but teach, living in their offices and waiting for another class to begin. None of you ever took the time to realize that we were human too."

Malfoy looks as though he is resisting the urge to stare down at his shoes like a chastened schoolboy. "I'd have thought you'd be helping Granger try to fix all this," he mutters.

Hermione Granger had not even asked Minerva for her help, assuming as usual that she knew what she was doing and that the only help that would be of any good to her would come from other children like her. "You children. You always think the world is yours to save, that you deserve it all to be laid out for you like some kind of feast." A flash of anger seizes Minerva's heart and she grips the oar in her hand so tightly that it seems a miracle it doesn't splinter. "When they told us that the world was ending, none of you cared about what I was losing, everything I spent years on. I fought for so long for this place, and you always assumed it was so it would be here for you." 

She needs to look away from him then, needs to not see the befuddled and helpless look on his face that cries for her to help him, so she looks past him at the ruins of the castle. It had once meant everything to her, this blasted collection of stones, and she realizes as she stares at it that it still does, that it is all she has left. It seems pointless, then, to rage at the boy for assuming that her life was still what it had always been. She turns her face to the sky and lets out a sigh as the strange light washes over her. "You don't know what you're losing," she whispers. "I do."

Malfoy grabs the side of her boat then. "Where's Harry Potter, Professor?" he asks, his voice desperate and harsh.

Minerva looks back at him, sees the fear in his eyes. It would be so easy to just leave, to give him nothing. It isn't as though he has ever done her the slightest good deed in his life, or any good deed at all that she can think of. He has been the worst of her students, self absorbed and callous, vindictive and shallow, and obnoxious to boot. No one could blame her for cutting him off. 

"Where he always is," she says instead, taking pity on him, embracing for one last time her responsibility to look out for the next generation, even if it is the last. "With the dead." She raps at his knuckles to loosen his grip on her boat and then pulls away before he can say anything else. 

She rows for some time, not thinking, not looking at anything but the bottom of the little boat. The hour that remains seems like the longest in her life, and she thinks that it should feel like the shortest. It would be nice to say that she has no regrets, but Minerva is done with lying to herself. If she could go back and say yes to Filius she would, but even if she'd had a Time-Turner it likely wouldn't work, not this close to the end. No, she knows she will have to live with her choice and make the best of it.

As Rosmerta's voice counts down the time, Minerva skirts the perimeter of the lake, tracing with her eyes every contour of the land. It is hers, this desolate place, and she is determined to etch it into her mind until the last moment, determined that she will love something before the end, even a destroyed relic like Hogwarts. She sees, in the distance, two figures tussling at the white tomb, and she hopes that Potter and Malfoy will be happy, even if only for these last few moments. 

Her arms ache terribly but she presses on until she hears, at last, that only a minute remains. She throws the oars aside for the last time and draws out the apple from her basket, and without hesitating she bites into it. 

It is the most delicious thing she has ever tasted.


End file.
